Variety of Material

Winner: Jamplay

Whilst both have an enormous amount of material, Jamplay just have that little bit more when it comes to variety. There’s something for everyone from beginners to expert, for those wanting to write songs and for those wanting to play songs, learn a variety of different genres etc.

Quantity of Instructors

Winner: Jamplay

The number of instructors certainly doesn’t necessarily make one website better than another. The quality of those instructors is more important.

But the more instructors there are the more likely that you will get a greater variety of material, more different styles to learn and you have more options for which instructor to go with if there are some you don’t particularly enjoy learning from.

Quality of Instructors

Winner: Guitar Tricks

Though Jamplay has more instructors, I thought the quality of the instructors at Guitar Tricks was higher. They were slightly more likeable overall. Still a bit cheesy at times but overall I think they explained things better and their lessons had better structure to them.

Ease of Following the Lessons

Winner: Guitar Tricks

I found the Guitar Tricks lessons were easier to follow for a couple of reasons.

The quality of the instructors

The way the lessons are structured in an easy to follow path

The Progress Tracker they use

The user friendliness of the website

Song Learning

Winner: Guitar Tricks

If your only reason for learning guitar is to learn songs then Guitar Tricks is the place for you. Mostly because of the sheer number of songs they have (and they’re adding more all the time) and also because of the way the songs are taught.

Song Writing

Winner: Jamplay

If you’re more into song writing or think that song writing is something you might want to get into then Jamplay is stronger and offers more in this area.

Theory

Winner: Jamplay

Whilst both do have a fair bit on theory, Jamplay just has that little bit more.

User Friendliness of Website

Winner: Tie

Originally I gave this to Guitar Tricks – but Jamplay have made some major improvements to their platform. They are now both very easy to navigate. See all the improvements that Jamplay has made in my updated Jamplay Review

What was here originally:

The Guitar Tricks site is super easy to navigate. You know exactly where to start and where are you are at all times. Jamplay is not quite as easy to navigate.

Price

Winner: Jamplay

UPDATE (May 2017): When I originally wrote this post Jamplay didn’t have a free trial. Now they do, and since they are cheaper over a year and the fact that they’ve also increased their money back guarantee from 7 days to 30 days, I’ve changed this so that Jamplay win out.

What was here originally:

Jamplay have 3 different pricing structures where you can pay per month, per quarter or per year.

You can cancel anytime and they have a money back guarantee if you decide it’s not for you in the first 7 days.

Guitar Tricks have two different pricing structures – monthly and yearly. You can sign up for free and try everything out for a full two weeks without paying anything. It’s easy to cancel at the end of the two weeks if you don’t want to continue.

They also offer a full 60 day money back guarantee.

Monthly

Quarterly

Yearly

Jamplay

$19.95

$49.95 ($16.65/month)

$159.95 ($13.33/month)

Guitartricks

$19.95

N/A

$179 ($14.91/month)

So even though Jamplay is slightly cheaper if you go for yearly, and they do have a quarterly option, I have given this to Guitar Tricks – just on the back of their free 2 week trial and their longer guarantee period.

With Guitar Tricks you get a full two weeks to decide if you want to pay anything and then if you decide to stay on and pay you have 60 more days to decide if you think it’s worth the money (and it is, in my opinion, but it’s always nice to see for yourself).

Overall

Winner: Jamplay

I have reversed my previous verdict. It was a tough call to make but I think that the recent improvements that Jamplay have made just gets them ahead.

It’s a very tight race but improvements in their user friendliness, their lessons for beginners and their inclusion of a free trial have just brought them above Guitar Tricks.

Guitar Tricks would still be my preferred option for those who are really just looking to learn songs and want a more guided structured way to learn songs than just going onto you tube and guitar tab sites.

Quality of Lessons:

Guitartricks

Variety of Material:

Jamplay

Quantity of Instructors:

Jamplay

Quality of Instructors:

Guitartricks

Ease of Following the Lessons:

Guitar Tricks

Song Learning:

Guitar Tricks

Song Writing:

Jamplay

Theory:

Jamplay

User Friendliness of Website:

Tie

Price:

Jamplay

Overall

Jam Play

What was here originally:

Winner: Guitar Tricks

This was a tightly run race. Both websites offer high quality guitar lessons and either would be a good investment. But Guitar Tricks just tips it for me overall.

They won some of the more important categories, in my opinion, including ease of following the lessons, quality of the lessons and quality of the instructors.

For beginner and intermediate guitarists or anyone who has been self-taught and wants to fill in any gaps then I would go with Guitar Tricks.

However, if you are a more advanced player looking to expand your abilities, you want more theory, more styles and more to do with song writing then you should also consider Jamplay.

Quality of Lessons:

Guitartricks

Variety of Material:

Jamplay

Quantity of Instructors:

Jamplay

Quality of Instructors:

Guitartricks

Ease of Following the Lessons:

Guitar Tricks

Song Learning:

Guitar Tricks

Song Writing:

Jamplay

Theory:

Jamplay

User Friendliness of Website:

Guitar Tricks

Price:

Guitar Tricks

Overall

Guitar Tricks

Final Verdict

Both sites are quality guitar lesson sites and the there are areas where Guitar Tricks still outdoes Jamplay (IMO) but overall I’ve had to reverse my call here and give it to Jamplay.

If you check out the reviews in the links below you’ll see how close I consider them overall with Jamplay receiving a score of 92/100 and Guitar Tricks a 91/100.

There are lot of people in the Jamplay camp and a lot on the side of Guitartricks – which is no surprise really given that both are high quality guitar lesson websites with their own strengths and weaknesses.

But this one has to be awarded to Guitar Tricks as they take out the more important categories – and because they are better at catering to those that are most likely to need lessons – the Beginners, Intermediate players and those looking to fill in the missing pieces.

Thanks for reading and I hope this has helped you to decide which lessons will be best for you.

To learn more about both lesson providers check out my full thorough reviews on each at the links below:

Comments

Nate that was a great review on the differences between the two guitar sites. I liked how you broke the categories into bullet points and then rated the better of the two. Good use of separating each category. Good info on why each site was better for each category. Nice job!

It’s crazy all of the things that you can learn online right now. What a cool thing to pay a monthly subscription and have access 24/7 to lessons I can only imagine what this will do for people that want to play 10 hours a day and learn lessons all day long. I find it interesting that the two companies were so close… however, i must say that I feel like song writing and theory would be important so I would definitely pick Jamplay…

Yeah it’s definitely crazy what you can learn online. And people have become pretty good at teaching through the online medium – and with technology the way it is, you can actually learn guitar well online. It’s not just some chord charts and some text – it’s video lessons with various camera angles and various interactive tools.

If song writing and theory are important to you, then Jamplay is probably the better option for you like you say. I would recommend guitar tricks to beginners and intermediate players but Jamplay for more advanced guitarists looking to expand their repertoire.

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